Labour force includes all
those individuals 16 years of age and over who worked for pay or profit during
the reference week or actively sought paid employment during the four week
prior to the reference week, where they are active in labour market. Labour force
are comprised of both the employed and the unemployed.
According to the Amtul
Hafeez and Eatzaz Ahmed (2002) female labour force participation has an
important contribution in socioeconomic development by providing a second
income and therefore reducing poverty.
Diagram 1: Labor force
participation of female and male
Based on diagram 1 above,
it show the labour force participation among female and male from years 1948 to
2004. The participation of among female increasing over year by year, while the
participation among male worker decreasing over the year. The increasing of
women in the labour force maybe due to increasing in level of education, or
decreasing the traditional perception among old people towards women where
women only can be as a wife and mother towards their children.
The several economics factors
of shifting a women from “not in the labour force” to in the labour force are:
1. Increase standard of
living
2. Inflation
3. Financial Problem/
increase purchasing power
4. Government policy
5 Technology
The first factor might
shift a women from “not in the labour force” to in the labour force is to
increase the standard of living. Standard of living are closely related to
quality of life. The standard of living includes factors such as income,
quality and availability of employment, class disparity, poverty rate, quality
and affordability of housing, hour of work required to purchase necessities,
inflation rate and affordable access to quality healthcare. Women participate
in the labour force to increase the standard of living to get the comfortable
life due to inflation rate that faced by Malaysian or others countries
nowadays. Besides that, it also due to salary of the breadwinner (husband) are
not enough, so women force to participate in the labour force to earn the wage
to get more comfortable life, where it help them to easily access in healthcare
system and to provide a good education level to their children. As we know,
nowadays are the Information Technology (IT) era. People looks IT as a
necessity and as we can see, nowadays almost all people have a smart phone such
as Ipad, Samsung Galaxy Note and Iphone. So to have one of it, they have to
work to earn the money to buy the mobile phone. So to increase the standard of
living women have to participate in labour force, to increase their quality of
life.
The second factor is
inflation. In economics, inflation is a sustained increase in the general price
level of goods and services in an economy over a period of time. When the
general price level raises, each unit of currency buys fewer goods and
services. For example, the price of house, land, car, rental house and good and
services are increased due to inflation, so it force the one or more of the
family members to seek the job from not involved in labour force to involve in
labour force. So women have to seek a job to help their husband to pays those
bill and to pays the educational cost of their children.
The third factor is
financial problem and to increase purchasing power. For example the breadwinner
of the family that is the husband or the father of the family was sick or does
not able work due to accident, so it force women became as a breadwinner of the
family, where women have to participate in the labour force to earn the money
to bear their husband healthcare cost and for the family living. Due to
financial problem also, women enter the labour force to increase their
purchasing power, means that they does not need to depend on their husband wage
to buy the thing that they desire to owns. The financial problem faced by the
family nowadays is a major factors that force women to involve in the labour
force. It is to help their husband to provide good education level and a good
quality of life to their family especially to their children.
The fourth factor is the
government policy, where government increase or give an employment opportunity
to the women. Before this, women always victim of discrimination where they
does not get same job opportunity as male. They also the victim of sexual harassment.
Due to these factors, the number participation of women in the labour force are
smaller than male. So when government introduce women protection act such as “Sexual Harassment of Women at Workplace Act”
and “Laws on violence against women”
the participation of women in the labour force are increase, because they was
protected by the government and company policy. The others government policy
that increase women labour force in the labour force is the maternity leave. If
you become pregnant while in employment, you entitled to take maternity leave.
The entitlement to a basic period of maternity leave from employment extends to
all female employees (including casual workers), regardless of how you have
been working for the organisation or the number of hours worked per week. So
the “Maternity Protection Acts 1994 and 2004” introduced by the government in
Malaysia was increase the participation of women in the labour market, where
they still can work even after give birth.
The last factor is technology.
The use of technology in industrial as their capital also help the
participation of women in the labour market. For example, before the exist of
technology, manufacturing industry use a lot of male energy, where they need
the energy of male for lifting the thing, but when the company invent in
technology it make the work become more easier. So at the end the number of
male worker decrease because their services are not required due to replace by
technology. The technology make work became easier, so it give a job
opportunity to the women where they able to do manufacturing process as well as
male because it does not use a lot of energy.
The decreasing number of worker among male in the manufacturing industry
also as a factor the employer hire women in their firm, because women have a
same productivity level as male or may be more productive than male.
As a conclusion, there are
lots of economics factors that might shift a woman from “not in the labour
force” to in the labour force such as to increase the standard of living,
inflation, financial problem, increase
the purchasing power, government policy and technology. Other than that factors
is due to education level which is increasing among women nowadays, family
problem such as divorce or increasing number of single mothers. The government
policy such as maternity leave and sexual harassment act for women help them be
protected and able to encourage them to involve in labour force. Besides that a
minimum wage also a factor of increasing number of female worker in the labour
force, where this policy able to protect their wage being discriminate due to
different gender and sex.
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